Archive for July, 2007

GReeeeN – Aa, domo. Hajimemashite.

Since when my site become Jpop lyric site? Nevermind, but actually I checked my site analysis, a lot of clicks is through the searching of Japan lyrics. Thanks for the support and this time I want to introduce you GReeeeN’s first full album “Aa, domo. Hajimemashite” (あっ、ども。はじめまして。). It is a very nice album! A must listen album for 2007.

The songs in this album that I prefer is: Michi, Ai Uta, Midori, and Tegami ~kimitachi e~. I had been search through this albums lyric but I only found the Hiragana version. Now I convert it into romaji and please have a look! Through the translation and my little knowledge on Nihongo, I found out that their songs are very meaningful and touching. All the album’s songs were written by them. Honto ni sugoi desu ne!

Album Detail

Released: 27.June.2007

Tracklist

  1. Michi (道; Road)
  2. Day by Day
  3. Ai Uta (愛唄; Love Song)
  4. HIGH G.K. LOW ~Hajikero~ (~ハジケロ~)
  5. NEW LIFE
  6. Koinu (子犬; Puppy)
  7. MISS YOU
  8. Tegami (手紙; Letter)
  9. Party People (パリピポ)
  10. Reggae Reggae (レゲレゲ)
  11. Midori (ミドリ; Green)

Actually I’m using translation site to translate it to romaji. And after the translation, I listen to the song and follow the lyric to make sure the lyrics is correct or not. Some songs in there is very fast paced, and only can say is the lyrics provided here is 95% accurate. Read on to listen to the song as well as lyric!

Click on song title to expand/hide lyric.

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Otsuka Ai – PEACH/HEART

It’s summer, it’s happy and relaxing holiday season so Otsuka Ai brings you a single that full of summer happy delight called “PEACH/HEART”. This single was just released on the 25th of July. “PEACH” is the theme song of the current airing hit drama “Hanazakari no Kimitachi e” starring Oguri Shun, Maki Horikita and Ikuma Toma. I just checked the Oricon single daily chart, this single was topping the chart for 4 days in a row, I think it will become no.1 in the weekly chart too.

“PEACH” is happy song like Sakuranbo or SMILY, while “HEART” is slow soft song. Both of the songs are not bad actually, but I prefer HEART more, because Ai-chan can perform better when singing slow song. This single comes with 4 different covers, two covers for CD and DVD version each. If you look at it carefully, the covers are join able, demonstrated below. And the icon for “PEACH” and “HEART” is kinda interesting too, it is the same image but one is upside down.

Read on to get to listen to both songs as well as lyrics! For more single review, check Ikimasshoi+.

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本當超面白! Lets talk Nihongo influences

Probably when you read the title you will think what is that?? Yes, today I want to talk a little about the Japanese language influence in Chinese contemporary language. 本當超面白 or in Jap “Honto cho-omoshiroi” means “very interesting”. I found this word while reading MILK magazine. The article is about Japanese stuff so the author integrate some Japanese word into it, and I found it quite interesting.

The Nihongo influence particularly strong in Asia countries that speaks Chinese especially Taiwan and China. Thanks to Astro, I got to watch many Taiwan entertainment shows. They use Japanese words like “人気” (Ninki – means popular), “卡哇衣” (Kawaii – means cute) and “哦衣西” (Oishii – means delicious). There is another which I think is worth mentioning is in the game show, when the guest is failed to advance, instead of putting “可惜”, they use “残念 (Zannen)”! Hahaha.

In my humble opinion, I think there is some reason of using Japanese language instead of original Chinese, first it makes the language more interesting. Second, it feels more trendy and young that will attract younger audiences. As you know, the Chinese 汉字 (Kanji) was been integrated in Japanese language, and Japan now is popular and this is common that those Kanji is being integrated into other languages.

Actually it is quite interesting on how the Japanese interpret Kanji, for example “人気” mentioned above. If direct translate to Chinese it means “people gas”. Because the thing is popular, so many people wants to buy it so the “gas” becomes a lot make the item “hot”. Another one is “無料 (Muryou)” which means FREE. So because is free so no need material (money). What about need money? Maybe you will think is “有料”. Yup, you’re right!

Some other interesting examples like “大丈夫” (Daijoubu – no problem. Chinese – gentlemen). Because even got problem you will also said no problem, so you are very gentlemen and “面倒臭” (Mendokusai – troublesome. Chinese – face down stinks). Because you feel troublesome, so you will turn down your face and it looks stinks”, hahahaha.

JUNE – You and Me

Today, I want to introduce a nice ballad called “You and Me” by JUNE. This love ballad illustrates the feeling of JUNE’s unrequited love of his first love, which now he is still can’t forget about it. With this memory, he wrote out this song with his truth feeling.

Actually, i know this song through PV, because my favorite idol Kaho was in it. In the PV, Kaho acted as a girlfriend, who can’t speak and hear, of a boy who loves to sing with his guitar. They fall in love and have happy moment together but the boy wants to pursue his singing dream and he had no choice but leave the girl. He was uncertainty for a moment “should i just be with her…or chase my dream?”

Finally they arrived at the train platform. The boy step into the train, and the door closed. Through the window glass, the girl said “Ganbatte….Mata aimashou?” (Please work hard and we shall meet again?). Finally the train leave… In the train, the boy found his guitar plectrum in his pocket and there is message leave by the girl. It says “I can hear you” which led the boys into tears. Awwww, the song is very sad and beautiful.

JUNE and co.

This is JUNE’s 3rd single, which released on the July 11th. JUNE is a Korean and he is just 20 years old! Since small he was influenced by music genre’s like RnB and soul, which developed him into this kind of emotional singing style. Well Korean are famous of their real and outstanding love song singing style, no wonder my sister also said that very Korea feel when first time heard.

For me this is the third person I knew that a male solo Korean sings Japanese song since K (who sings “Only Human”, theme song for 1 litre of tears) and RUI (“Sayonara3”, Rondo theme song). All of them sings very well and I definitely like this song. To know him more, log on to his official site or ThePPN. Read more to get to listen to the song as well as lyric! Continue reading

Surf in another dimension?

Screen are flat, normally what we see on the net is just a flat piece of info. But there is designers that breaks that boundary. They want the viewer to experience that actually you are in the virtual 3D web space which create the illusion to viewer. These websites are outstanding and inspiring just like M. C. Escher‘s drawing partially shown above.

The websites listed here are powered by Flash, and they are range from 3D menu system to the whole 3D web environment. Please enjoy! Continue reading

Bon Odori Fan Vector Download

Last week, I and my friends went to the Bon Odori at Shah Alam, and I wrote an entry about it too. It was an enjoyable event and definitely looking forward to go again next year. When arriving the stadium, everyone will get a plastic fan to get yourself cold down. When I take back home, I observe the form of the fan and suddenly have one idea in mind, why don’t just make it into vector graphic?

The form of the fan is pretty straight forward and easy to construct. Below I will show you how I create it in Illustrator CS2 as well as the vector file for download. Perhaps you may want to ask why I use black color? Well is because recently i read a post in PingMag, it says that black is getting popular in Japan. Look at that black toilet roll, cool. So I also want to experiment black with this fan. Well I think the result is not bad! 😀

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Proposal Daisakusen swept Nikkan Sports awards

Recently Nikkan Sports unveiled the 11th Drama Grand Prix award for spring season drama 2007, and the spring drama hit “Proposal Daisakusen” swept all the awards!

Proposal Daisakusen deserves the sweep, because I think this drama is the best of spring and perhaps in 2007. The story is fresh, romantic and meaningful. Plus the great acting and chemistry between the actors and actresses makes this drama a truly class of its own. Not to mentioned the theme song “Ashita haresu kana” by Kuwata Keisuke, which is very nice and well fit into the drama. From the result, we can see that many Japanese also like this drama a lot! Omedetou!

Maybe you will think that every episode will start with “hallelujah chance” which pretty repetitive, but what makes it interesting is the stories everytime Ken went back to win the Rei’s heart back. Expecially when he went back to the high school era, those scenes and happenings are very nostalgic to me, even is just a small little thing will touches my heart. Sometimes is quite creative also: I never think of going to headmaster’s seat and spin around hahah! 😀 Those scenes make me think that we should enjoy our high school era to the fullest.


Congrats! All of them were listed. Best drama of spring!

I like this drama a lot, not only because acted by my favorite Yamapi and Nagasawa Masami, it also brings me back a lot of my high school memories. This drama makes me want to “go back” to my high school era again. Ahhh natsukashi! Proposal Daisakusen saikou!

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Stephanie – Kimi ga Iru Kagiri

Again, thanks Music Station for intro me this new artists. Selected as one of the MSute’s Young Guns, Stephanie (ステファニー) was debuted in May 28, 2007 with the debut maxi “Kimi ga Iru Kagiri”, while this song was an ending theme of an anime “Kiss Dum“. What makes her so unique that she actually can sing in 5 octaves! SUGOI!

5 octaves singing ability

In Stephanie’s official website, they call her “The one and only super high tone voice in the world diva” (世界にたった1つの歌声スーパークリアハイトーンボイスの歌姫). From the interview in Music Station, she said that in the beginning, she was not satisfy about her voice so she decided to go for voice practices and now, she can sing in 5 octaves. Her voice and go sky up high! Really!

Because this is her selling point, so she had to present it in her debut song. So in the beginning of the song featuring her super high tone voice, well it actually captures my attention. And the song also has a lot of high notes which is a piece of cake for her. I can feel this is a song of courage, it tells you to never give up and always challenge your limit. Although the song is amazing, but still some part I felt is overpowered by her ability because somehow the song is a bit less emotional. Maybe due to her young age (only 19!), she have to learn to use her ability at its best.

So, this is the new artist that you should watch! She will be releasing new single in following month, so stay tuned! Below are the song sample and lyric. Please enjoy.

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More free fonts & web gallery

What is so great about having a habit of surfing Del.icio.us’s Popular and Recent bookmarks is, you get to know the nice & inspiring websites that discovered by other people which is so convenient and useful! Thanks to this social networking site, I found another 2 sites that provide quality free fonts & web design gallery.

Die Gestalten free fonts

Die Gestalten offers free fonts featuring experimental display fonts in addition to single weights of the popular text fonts for trial. The free fonts is being added and updated regularly so be sure to visit this site frequently to get all the free fonts they have on offer! Sadly some fonts is available for MAC only.

Style Boost

Styleboost is a gallery for showcasing beautiful web sites. It has been around since January 2001 and is created, designed and maintained by Johan Bakken. The gallery is clean and simple. Every sites that is listed here not only will be categorized by its characteristics, it also categorized by the colors of the site. Plus, a short description to further understanding the listed websites and it also allow users to comment too.